


Alphanumeric

by tess1978



Series: Ripples [2]
Category: Fallout (Video Games), Fallout 4
Genre: Angst, Captive, Hurt/Comfort, Implied Sexual Content, Kissing, Loss and Grief, M/M, Not very smutty, Synths, it could probably handle an e rating but I don't want to mess with my track record, just a bit at the end
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-09-11
Updated: 2016-09-11
Packaged: 2018-08-14 08:17:05
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,762
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8005366
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tess1978/pseuds/tess1978
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The ex-paladin, Danse, has been trading since his expulsion from the Brotherhood of Steel and the destruction of the Prydwen. </p><p>When he is captured by a courser, the two synths begin a journey together and learn how much they really have in common.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Alphanumeric

He blinked at the bright sunlight streaming through the cracks in the shack, lifting his hand in an attempt to shade his eyes from the piercing pain it caused in his head. 

He tried to sit up, but a hand stopped him. An unfamiliar hand, dark skinned, broad, square fingers, clean nails. But he knew who it belonged to nonetheless. 

“You hit me. You didn’t have to hit me.”

“You are a trained soldier, M7-97. And for some reason you have no recall code on record. It was the most efficient way to capture you.”

“Why aren’t we in the Institute?” He brought his fingers to his temple and gingerly touched the lump there. 

The courser didn’t speak for a moment. “There was an explosion shortly after I neutralized you. I have no contact with the Institute nor can I access the relay. Therefore, when you are able to move, we will walk.”

“Hm.” Danse cautiously opened one eye and peered at the courser. He sat, knees splayed, on a nearby chair. He had a laser rifle on his lap which he was cleaning. Danse watched for a moment as the courser worked, his strong looking hands surprisingly deft with the small components of the weapon. 

“What is your name?” he asked. 

“My designation is X6-88” the courser replied. 

“I’m Pala- um. I’m Danse.”

“You are M7-97.”

Danse closed his eyes as spots wavered in front of them. Fucking synths, he thought, before he passed out again.

*** 

X6 sat for a moment after M7 passed out. He looked at the tall synth on the mattress, intrigued. He’d never met anyone quite this… large before. He certainly didn’t look like any other synth he’d seen.

X6 tipped his head to the side, examining with interest the various scars and scrapes the other synth had. It must have been a rough existence on the surface. Hard. M7-97 had been missing over a decade. Most escaped synths didn’t survive for a fraction of that time. He felt a faint twinge of respect.

He pushed the thoughts away as he reached into his small bag and retrieved a stimpack. He looked at M7’s thick, black hair, the scruff of beard on his face, and was suddenly struck by the urge to reach out and touch him. Just once.

He straightened abruptly, disturbed by his thoughts. He applied the stimpack, then stood. Perhaps it would be wise to wait outside. 

***

Danse felt better the second time he awoke. Judging by the light coming through the wall, not much time had passed. An empty stimpack lay on the ground next to the mattress he was on, which explained his relative vigour. He sat up, and noticed he was alone. He stood, tentatively, and realized he felt normal. He wondered where his captor was. 

His question was answered a moment later as X6-88 entered the hut and looked up at him. “You are ready to go. Please don’t resist.” 

Danse took his first real look at the courser. He was a few inches shorter than Danse, broad shouldered, from what he could see under the thick leather coat he wore. He had clear, brown skin and a full mouth...

Danse looked away, annoyed with himself for finding a courser attractive. One who had captured him, to boot. 

He sighed. He shouldn’t be surprised. His track record for choosing partners was less than stellar. At least the courser was upfront about who he was. Unlike that traitor. Danse was so disgusted with himself for having been taken in by the former vault-dweller’s charm and good looks that he couldn’t even bring himself to say the man’s name in his head.

He brushed past X6 and went out the door. 

They walked in silence for most of the day, X6 keeping M7 in front. To keep him from escaping, he told himself, forcing his eyes away from the other synth’s backside for the millionth time. He was becoming more irritated by the minute. Between his inability to contact anyone from the Institute and the uncomfortable feeling growing in his lower belly as he watched M7 stride down the road, he was quickly losing patience with his entire existence. 

And he still had at least a day of this left to go. “Shit,” he cursed quietly under his breath.

Danse turned at the sound, one thick eyebrow raised. 

X6 pointed his laser rifle at him, indicating Danse should keep walking. 

“Where are we going, exactly?” Danse asked.

“Why, so you can escape and tell your friends?”

“I don’t have any friends. Not any more. You may not have noticed, but the Prydwen was destroyed nearly a month ago. Not that I was welcome there any longer anyway.”

X6 paused. He knew this statement to be true.

“We are headed towards the Institute, which is in the vicinity of Cambridge. I am hoping a closer range will allow for radio reception.”

“And what’s this explosion you mentioned?” 

There was a long silence. “It came from the vicinity of the Institute.”

“Do you think the Institute is gone?”

X6 chose not to answer that question. 

They walked in silence for another hour or so, until X6 spotted a cabin. They headed in that direction.

“I suppose you need to rest for the night,” the courser asked. 

“I do require sleep, still, apparently.” The reply was tinged with sarcasm.

“A shortcoming we all have.” 

When they arrived, Danse saw a door set into the ground. It was likely a root cellar. Danse pulled the handle and found to his surprise a small, but well stocked fallout shelter. It had somehow never been occupied, judging by the neat prewar stacks of food and supplies. It housed a table, a chair, and a small bed.

The two men stared at each other for a moment, sizing each other up. Danse would normally have attempted to wrestle the man into submission, but all evidence in the past had indicated that coursers were augmented and therefore much more difficult to subdue or kill than humans or ordinary third generation synths. In addition, he was curious about the explosion. He decided to go along with X6 until a better opportunity arose.

X6 was attempting to determine if M7 was an escape threat. Although he had cooperated up to this point, he didn’t know if he was just waiting for X6 to drop his guard. He was unfamiliar with situations like this. Most synths he had captured were disabled and teleported immediately. He had never spent much time with them before. 

“At least there’s plenty to eat,” M7 interrupted, looking around. X6 watched as he opened a cupboard and began taking cans of food down. “I think this is Pork’n’beans,” he said, looking at one. “The label’s a bit faded. There’s cram… I hate cram. I’d rather eat raw bloatfly. And...oh…”

X6 was curious despite himself. He leaned over to peek in the cupboard, but M7 was quicker and turned around with not one, not two, but seven packages of Fancy Lads Snack Cakes.

X6 hated most wasteland food, but he had a weak spot for snack cakes. They were overly sweet, covered in crystallized honey and topped with nasty frosting that he picked off when he was in private. He considered taking all seven boxes from the other synth - after all, he had the weapon - but the look in M7’s big brown eyes as he eyed the boxes in glee stayed his hand. The Director had said this one was special. Perhaps a positive relationship would make him less likely to attempt escape. 

He reached out and took one of the boxes from M7. He sat in the chair, not looking up as M7 sat in the other chair and both of them tore open their packages.

They made it through five and a half packages before they gave up. X6 was feeling a little ill, and M7 was leaning back in his chair, his arm over his eyes and groaning. X6 noticed M7 had a crumb stuck to the corner of his mouth. He was suddenly struck by the urge to step over to him and lick it off.

He looked away, horrified. 

Out of all the synths he’d recaptured since his augmentation and courser training, he had never had feelings like this. He’d never had feelings like this for anyone, although he knew of synths and coursers who had. He just thought he was above it, somehow.

He was suddenly irritated. He stood up and picked the empty boxes up off the table, stuffing them back in the cupboard and shutting it. 

He couldn’t leave, the captive would escape. He knew he would need sleep. He decided his best course of action would be to restrain the synth somehow. He removed the sheet from the bed and tore it into strips. He told M7 to lay down. The taller synth did, and X6 efficiently tied his hands to the bed using the strips of cloth. 

M7’s skin was warm under his hands, and he was unresisting as X6 tied his wrists. Somehow this made him even more irritable and he finished his task as quickly as possible before moving across the room and sitting down in front of the ladder that led outside.

“Get some sleep,” he said. We continue on in the morning. 

Neither man slept for a long time.

***

Danse walked ahead of X6 again the next day as they headed towards Cambridge. He tried not to look towards the abandoned Police Station where he had holed up with his recon team. It seemed like years ago already. Danse had heard a rumour that most of the people posted to the police station had been out on a patrol the day Paladin Foley had turned his back on the Brotherhood, stolen a vertibird, and destroyed the Prydwen. 

Danse felt personally responsible for that. He had been the one to sponsor Sam into the Brotherhood. He had let his feelings for the vault dweller override his usual caution. Danse frowned. He should have known Sam wasn’t to be trusted the minute he turned his back on the Brotherhood and saved him from Maxson. He should have known Sam would pick a synth over doing the right thing. 

But he had been so grateful to still be alive that he had fallen right into the other man’s arms, following him for weeks like a lost puppy. Until the day he had asked him to stay in Sanctuary while he ran off to do an errand with the man in sunglasses. He’d shown up in the community only to be greeted by a swath of Sam’s former lovers. Danse realized then he’d never meant any more to him than just some convenient body to keep him warm at night. 

And then the Prydwen had fallen from the sky in a pillar of flame, and Danse had had to hear about it on the radio. And what was worse, he had to hear that Sam Foley, formerly of Vault 111, had been responsible. 

That was when Danse left Sanctuary. He’d begun trading again, mostly to keep himself in food and shelter until he could decide what he wanted to do with his life. And that was when he had been caught by this courser.

Danse glanced at X6. The other man was tall, although not as tall as Danse was. Lanky but strong, with short cropped curly black hair and sunglasses to hide his eyes. He wore a long leather coat, but his hands were bare and they gripped his laser rifle loosely, but with confidence. 

He remembered the warmth of those hands on his wrist from the night before when he had tied Danse to the bed. He closed his eyes for a moment picturing the hands sliding from his wrists to his arms…

He snapped his eyes open with a frown. Those were courser hands. The hands of a killer. And Danse was a captive. He was suddenly curious. _Why_ was he a captive? Danse had somehow managed to evade being recaptured by the Institute for years since he had escaped. Why did this courser find him now? He decided to ask.

“The Director of the Institute himself asked me to find you. He said he wanted you specifically, and he knew approximately where to find you.”

“Why did the Director want me?” 

“I do not know. I have not known the new Director long enough to understand his motives.”

“How long has he been the Director?” 

“Father appointed him approximately six weeks ago. So far, Director Foley seems to be-”

“Who?” Danse stopped and turned, facing X6 and putting his hand on his chest. “What did you say his name was?”

“The Director of the Institute is Sam Foley. He is the father of the previous Director, Shaun Foley.”

Danse stared at the courser for a minute, trying to process this new piece of information. 

“Sam. Foley.” He could barely breathe as the name passed his lips. 

Danse spun on his heel and stalked away. He paid no heed to the courser who called out after him to stop, shouting his synth designation.

That piece of shit. Lying scummy bastard. Paladin in the Brotherhood. Director of the Institute. Goddamn General of the Minutemen although that hadn’t been a secret. And what? What was he to the Railroad? Danse should have known. He should have known.

He wanted to hit something. To smash something, blow something up. He ignored X6, rounding the corner of a building, and came out directly in front of a group of at least a dozen raiders. 

“Ah, fuck,” he said. There was no hiding. There were too many of them to fight and anyway he was unarmed. All he could do was run. He turned on his heel and immediately sprinted back the way he came. 

He passed X6 at a run, headed back towards College Square. X6 had only a moment to decide if fighting the raiders was worth losing his captive. 

It wasn’t a hard choice.

He took off running after M7, catching up to him easily. X6 pointed towards the metro tunnel, and M7 headed that way. They should hopefully find a place to hide inside. 

Their hopes were momentarily dashed as they discovered the tunnel was occupied with a second group of raiders. Luckily, they weren’t spotted. They managed to duck into a small storage closet and lock the door behind them as the first group of raiders ran past. The loud noise of the outdoor gang attracted the indoor gang, and the synths listened in silence, breathing heavily, as the two groups confronted each other just outside the door. 

The argument grew violent quickly. X6 and Danse stood still in the tiny space, pressed together, listening. The fight went on for a long time. Danse listened intently at first, but he soon grew distracted by something else. 

X6’s back was pressed up against him as they stood leaning on the door. He was warm. Danse could feel the heat radiating off him even through their clothing. He could smell him too, a warm, leathery smell from the coat but also something unique that made Danse inhale heavily. 

X6 turned, and suddenly the two were face to face. The closet was too small for Danse to back up at all. Danse could feel X6’s breath on his cheek and he had the urge to close his eyes and lean into him. His eyes fell to the other man’s mouth. His lips were full, parted slightly. Danse wanted to flick his tongue across his lower lip. To see how he tasted.

X6 spoke quietly. “We must remain hidden until these raiders are gone. And then we will continue on our way to the Institute. I must perform my duty.”

Danse closed his eyes, forcing his mind back to reality. X6 was a courser, not a person. A machine, sent to hunt him down. To capture him. He was not a friend. He was not someone to become close with. He was the enemy. _I would do well to remember that._

He turned his face away and leaned into the wall. He focused on the fight outside, which was tapering off, and kept his mind off the man - the synth - trapped in the closet with him.

***

It was nearly an hour later when they decide it was safe to leave. They left the closet cautiously, peering around in the subway station for any sign of danger. There was nothing but several dead raiders.

X6 tilted his head towards the exit and they both headed that way, silently agreeing to remain as quiet and alert as possible. The mistakes from earlier could not be repeated. There was no guarantee they would be as lucky a second time. 

As they picked their way through the rubble of Cambridge, X6 became concerned. He should have been able to pick up some kind of signal from the Institute by now. Instead, there was only silence. He began to walk faster as his disquiet grew. There was something wrong. Something terrible, he knew it. 

And then they came to the ruins of CIT… or at least the place where it should have been. Instead of a derelict building and courtyard there was nothing. Nothing but a pit.

They had crept around the corner cautiously, fearing more raiders. They didn’t find raiders, however. Instead they found a crater, still smoking from the explosion that had happened thirty two hours earlier. A field hospital had been set up nearby, but it wasn’t Institute people running it. X6 had been around long enough to recognize Railroad when he saw them.

“Shit,” he swore under his breath. 

M7 turned to look at him, one heavy brow lifted in curiosity. 

“The Institute is gone. And it looks like the Railroad were the ones responsible.”

He sat down, leaning against the wall they were hiding behind. He’d been hoping. Desperately hoping that the explosion had not been the Institute, his home, everything he’d ever cared about. 

But that hope had vanished like dust in the wind when he’d crept around that corner. 

He didn’t look at M7 as he crouched down next to him, but he did speak. “You might as well leave. There’s no point in holding you captive if I haven’t got anywhere to bring you to.”

M7 didn’t move. He stayed where he was for a long minute. Finally he spoke. “When Sam Foley destroyed the Prydwen, he did so with two Railroad agents. He was a trusted member of the Brotherhood. A Kn... a Paladin. And he betrayed us. Them. And now here’s the Institute, gone, and Railroad heavies crawling all over. I think we know where Sam Foley’s loyalties truly lay, and it isn’t with either of us.”

X6 looked at M7 and whispered, “How could he do this, M7? The Institute was my home. My family. The other coursers I fought and trained with? They were my brothers. And now it’s all gone.”

***

Danse recognized the look in X6’s eyes. He knew how the courser felt; it had only been recently that he’d felt the same himself, ousted from the only real home he’d ever had, only to watch that home be destroyed by a traitor. The very same traitor who’d destroyed X6’s home. 

Sympathy for a courser. Danse couldn’t believe the world had come to this. 

Somehow he got X6 to his feet, and they headed back the way they had come. It was well after dark by the time they found the fallout shelter from the night before. They stayed there for two days, until Danse decided to go back to the trading route he had begun to establish before X6 had captured him. After much discussion, the ex-courser agreed to join him for a few days. At least until he decided what he wanted to do with himself.

They made a good team. Between the two of them, they could dismantle or repair anything. They were deadly as they cleared old buildings of mutated creatures and scavenged every last item, scrapping, building, and repairing weapons to trade to the various merchants around the Commonwealth. 

They were ambushed several times in the first few months by raiders, but after they managed to take out a whole squadron of Gunners, their reputation spread, and everyone gave them a wide berth.

It was not common knowledge that they were synths; they didn’t advertise that fact. Instead they went by Danse and Alex, the name X6 had chosen for himself after Danse had convinced him that passing as human was in their best interests. 

They were together all the time, but they didn’t speak much. They had never discussed how long X would stay or what kind of future they wanted. And they never discussed how they felt, either. They lay near each other as they camped at night, each intensely aware of the closeness of the other, but neither willing to take that first step, to take the risk of reaching out a hand to the other. To acknowledge what really lay between them.

It may have carried on like that forever, the unspoken agreement to not ever take that first step, until one evening when they walked through the gates of Bunker Hill and found Sam Foley shouting orders at a crew of builders as they worked together to raise some sort of wall for a new building. 

Danse didn’t notice X6 reach for his sidearm, and it was only because he noticed the sniper, MacCready, sitting on a wall nearby lift his rifle and point it in their direction that he thought to turn and put his hand on X6’s chest to stop him from doing something foolish.

Mac hopped down from the wall, his rifle still pointed at the two synths. Some of the workers stopped what they were doing to watch, drawing Sam’s attention. His eyes widened as he realized what was going on. He caught Mac’s eye and signalled him to lower the weapon. Mac did so, clearly with some reluctance, and hung back as Sam walked up to the two synths. 

He stopped when he was in front of them. 

Danse clenched his jaw. He didn’t say anything, but he remembered how close they were, and how _fucking personal_ this man’s betrayal had been. He hadn’t even realized how much he had been holding in his feelings until he found himself face to face with this man. He had been his protege, his friend, his _lover_ , and this had meant _nothing_ to him. He’d turned his back on everything. 

Suddenly he regretted stopping X6 from shooting him.

“I’m glad to see you both well,” Sam said, looking from one to the other. “I’d heard… I’d hoped… well, I’m just glad you’re both well.”

At least for once he wasn’t being flippant. 

“You’re both welcome to stay here. This community… it’s got a good percentage of synths. You won’t be in danger here.”

X6 and Danse just stared at him until he looked away, obviously uncomfortable. MacCready had come up beside him at this point, his weapon lowered but still ready. Danse knew between him and X6 they could take out both the sniper and Sam, but Mac was certain to put a few holes in them both first. And he didn’t know the disposition of the rest of the community. 

He glanced at X6. He was still holding his laser rifle. When Danse caught his eye, the ex-courser sighed and pointedly switched it off. It seemed the whole crowd let out a sigh of relief. He noticed the crew go back to work, and soon the crowd dispersed. 

Sam stepped up to them, carefully, his expression conciliatory. He took a deep breath. “Look, I am sorry, for what it’s worth. To both of you.”

Danse and X6 continued to look at him, silently. It seemed they were in agreement on this one point. 

“I’m glad you found each other. I sent X6 out to find you that day, Danse, because I thought you two would need each other. I’m hoping since you’re here together that I was right.”

Danse glanced over at X6. A muscle was twitching in his jaw, the only outward sign of how he was feeling. When he looked back at Sam, he looked away, unable to meet their eyes. 

“You should have let me die with them. With my family. With Father,” X6 whispered. “You should have let him die with his Brothers.”

“I cared about you too much - both of you - to let that happen,” Sam replied. “I can’t atone for this. I don’t expect your forgiveness. But please. I need you to know it wasn’t easy.”

MacCready lifted a hand and placed it on Sam’s shoulder. Danse lifted one eyebrow when Sam brushed it off, guilt shading his eyes. 

“Like I said, you’re welcome to stay. Mac and I are headed out tonight, so you won’t run into us again here. There’s a room available if you want.”

Danse hesitated, then nodded curtly. He wasn’t going to forgive Sam Foley, but he would take what he was offering. 

***

Danse glanced at X6 as he set his pack on the floor in the room Sam had given them. It was small but boasted two twin beds and a basin of water. Better amenities than most places these days. He began sorting through his items wordlessly, following their usual ritual when they settled somewhere for the night. He stopped, however, when he realized that X6 was just sitting there. 

Danse hesitated a moment. He wanted to turn away, make some excuse to leave the room. But maybe now was the time to talk. The time for two synths to show their human side. 

He sat next to X on the bed and put his hand on his back. The courser uniform was gone, had been for months, and X6’s back felt warm under the flannel shirt he wore.

X6 turned to him. “The worst part was that I trusted him. That Father - Shaun - was his own son.”

Danse nodded. He knew this. He knew… he _understood_ , how X6 felt. Maybe more than anybody else possibly could. In a lot of ways they were the same. Fighters, mourning a lost family, betrayed by the same man. 

The last few months would have been unbearably bleak without X6 quietly at his back for every moment. It was a miracle that fate had brought them together.

He frowned. Not fate at all. It was Sam who brought them together. 

He looked at X6, and he could see the same realization dawning in his eyes as well.

Danse didn’t think. He couldn’t. The time for thinking was past. The time for talking was in the future. Now was the time for something else. He leaned close without hesitation and kissed X6 full on the mouth.

They’d been waiting too long, it seemed. X6’s hand came up to tangle in Danse’s hair. His hand was strong, urgent. Not tentative like human hands. Danse suddenly realized he didn’t have to hold back with X; that he could take the full brunt of his desire in a way that nobody else had ever been able to. 

He thrust his tongue in X’s mouth, urgently, and X reciprocated, biting at his lips and pulling at his shirt. He moaned when X’s mouth found its way to his ear and he whispered, “I’ve wanted this. For so long, Danse.” 

Danse shuddered, realizing that this was the first time X had ever called him by name. The sound of it on his lips had his cock hardening in his pants as his mouth found the ex-courser’s again.

The next hour was rough, some of their clothes torn in the rush to remove them, and they brought each other pleasure with hands and mouths and filthy whispered words in the dark, and when it was done, and they both lay sated and spent, Danse realized that what they had was more than just physical, or companionship, or some shared experience that only the two of them could really understand. What they had was real, and Danse didn’t want it to end. 

He pulled X6 close, and X responded by turning in his arms and slipping his hand around his waist. 

Danse rested his chin on X6’s head. As he fell asleep, he realized that tomorrow was going to be the start of a whole new chapter.


End file.
